新概念第三册 lession21-25

Lesson 21 Daniel Mendoza
How many unsuccessful attempts did Mendoza make before becoming Champion of all England?

Boxing matches were very popular in England two hundred years ago.
In those days, boxers fought with bare fists for prize money. Because of this, they were known as 'prizefighters'.
However, boxing was very crude, for these were no rules and a prizefighter could be seriously injured or even killed during a match.
One of the most colourful figures in boxing history was Daniel Mendoza, who was born in 1764.
The use of gloves was not introduced until 1860, when the Marquis of Queensberry drew up the first set of rules.
Though he was technically a prizefighter, Mendoza did much to change crude prizefighting into a sport,
for he brought science to the game. In this day, Mendoza enjoyed tremendous popularity.
He was adored by rich and poor alike.
Mendoza rose to fame swiftly after a boxing match when he was only fourteen years old.
This attracted the attention of Richard Humphries who was then the most eminent boxer in England.
He offered to train Mendoza and his young pupil was quick to learn.
In fact, Mendoza soon became so successful that Humphries turned against him.
The two men quarrelled bitterly and it was clear that the argument could only be settled by a fight.
A match was held at Stilton, where both men fought for an hour.
The public bet a great deal of money on Mendoza, but he was defeated.
Mendoza met Humphries in the ring on a later occasion and he lost for a second time.
It was not until his third match in 1790 that he finally beat Humphries and became Champion of England.
Meanwhile, he founded a highly successful Academy and even Lord Byron became one of his pupils.
He earned enormous sums of money and was paid as much as $100 for a single appear one of his pupils.
He earned enormous sums of money and was paid as much as $100 for a single appearance.
Despite this, he was so extravagant that he was always in debt.
After he was defeated by a boxer called Gentleman Jackson, he was quickly forgotten.
He was sent to prison for failing to pay his debts and died in poverty in 1836.

Lesson 22 By heart
Which actor read the letter in the end, the aristocrat or the gaoler?

Some plays are so successful that they run for years on end, In many ways,
this is unfortunate for the poor actors who are required to go on repeating the same lines night after night.
One would expect them to know their parts by heart and never have cause to falter. Yet this is not always the case.
A famous actor in a highly successful play was once cast in the role of an aristocrat who had been imprisoned in the Bastille for twenty years.
In the last act, a gaoler would always come on to the stage with a letter which he would hand to the prisoner.
Even though the noble was expected to read the letter at each performance, he always insisted that it should be written out in full.
One night, the gaoler decided to play a joke on his colleague to find out if,
after so many performances, he had managed to learn the contents of the letter by heart.
The curtain went up on the final act of the play and revealed the aristocrat sitting alone behind bars in his dark cell.
Just then, the gaoler appeared with the precious letter in his bands. He entered the cell and presented the letter to the aristocrat.
But the copy he gave him had not been written out in full as usual.
It was simply a blank sheet of paper. The gaoler looked on eagerly, anxious to see if his fellow actor had at last learnt his lines.
The noble stared at the blank sheet of paper for a few seconds. Then, squinting his eyes, he said: 'The light is dim. Read the letter to me'.
And he promptly handed the sheet of paper to the gaoler.
Finding that he could not remember a word of the letter either, the gaoler replied: 'The light is indeed dim, sire, I must get my glasses.'
With this, he hurried off the stage.
Much to the aristocrat's amusement, the gaoler returned a few moments later with a pair of glasses and the usual copy of the letter with he proceeded to read to the prisoner.

Lesson 23 One man's meat is another man's poison
What was it about snails that made the writer collect them for his friend on that in particular?

People become quite illogical when they try to decide what can be eaten and what cannot be eaten.
If you lived in the Mediterranean, for instance, you would consider octopus a great delicacy.
You would not be able to understand why some people find it repulsive.
On the other hand, your stomach would turn at the idea of frying potatoes in animal fat -- the normally accepted practice in many northern countries.
The sad truth is that most of us have been brought up to eat certain foods and we stick to them all our lives.
No creature has received more praise and abuse than the common garden snail.
Cooked in wine, snails are a great luxury in various parts of the world.
There are countless people who, ever since their early years, have learned to associate snails with food. My friend, Robert, lives in a country where snails are despised.
As his flat is in a large town, he has no garden of his own. For years he has been asking me to collect snails from my garden and take them to him.
The idea never appealed to me very much, but one day, after heavy shower,
I happened to be walking in my garden when I noticed a huge number of snails taking a stroll on some of my prize plants. Acting on a sudden impulse,
I collected several dozen, put them in a paper bag, and took them to Robert. Robert was delighted to see me and equally pleased with my little gift.
I left the bag in the hall and Robert and I went into the living room where we talked for a couple of hours.
I had forgotten all about the snails when Robert suddenly said that I must stay to dinner.
Snails would, of course, be the main dish. I did not fancy the idea and I reluctantly followed Robert out of the room.
To our dismay, we saw that there were snails everywhere: they had escaped from the paper bag and had taken complete possession of the hall!
I have never been able to look at a snail since then.

Lesson 24 A skeleton in the cupboard
Who was Sebastian?

We often read in novels how a seemingly respectable person or family has some terrible secret which has been concealed from strangers for years.
The English language possesses a vivid saying to describe this sort of situation.
The terrible secret is called 'a skeleton in the cupboard'.
At some dramatic moment in the story, the terrible secret becomes known and a reputation is ruined.
The reader's hair stands on end when he reads in the final pages of the novel that the heroine a dear old lady who had always been so kind to everybody,
had, in her youth, poisoned every one of her five husbands.
It is all very well for such things to occur in fiction. To varying degrees, we all have secrets which we do not want even our closest friends to learn,
but few of us have skeletons in the cupboard.
The only person I know who has a skeleton in the cupboard is George Carlton, and he is very pound of the fact. George studied medicine in his youth.
Instead of becoming a doctor, however, he became a successful writer of detective stories.
I once spend an uncomfortable weekend which I shall never forget at his house.
George showed me to the guestroom which, he said, was rarely used. He told me to unpack my things and then come down to dinner.
After I had stacked my shirts and underclothes in two empty drawers, I decided to hang one of the tow suits I had brought with me in the cupboard.
I opened the cupboard door and then stood in front of two suits I had brought with me in the cupboard.
I opened the cupboard door and then stood in front of it suits I had brought with me in the cupboard.
I opened the cupboard door and then stood in front of it petrified. A skeleton was dangling before my eyes.
The sudden movement of the door made it sway slightly and it gave me the impression that it was about to leap out at me.
Dropping my suit, I dashed downstairs to tell George. This was worse than "a terrible secret'; this was a read skeleton!
But George was unsympathetic. 'Oh, that,' he said with a smile as if he were talking about an old friend. '
That's Sebastian. You forget that I was a medical student once upon a time.'

Lesson 25 The Cutty Sark
What piece of bad luck prevented the Cutty Sark from winning the race?

One of the most famous sailing ships of the nineteenth century, the Cutty Sark, can still be seen at Greewich.
She stands on dry land and is visited by thousands of people each year.
She serves as an impressive reminder of the great ships of past.
Before they were replaced by steamships, sailing vessels like the Cutty Sark were used to carry tea from China and wool from Australia.
The Cutty Sark was one the fastest sailing ships that has ever been built.
The only other ship to match her was the Thermopylae. Both these ships set out from Shanghai on June 18th, 1872 on an exciting race to England.
This race, which went on for exactly four exactly four months, was the last of its kind.
It marked the end of the great tradition of ships with sails and the beginning of a new era.
The first of the two ships to reach Java after the race had begun was the Thermopylae, but on the Indian Ocean, the Cutty Sark took lead.
It seemed certain that she would be the first ship home, but during the race she had a lot of bad luck.
In August, she was struck by a very heavy storm during which her rudder was torn away.
The Cutty Sark rolled from side to side and it became impossible to steer her.
A temporary rudder was made on board from spare planks and it was fitted with great difficulty.
This greatly reduced the speed of the ship, for there was a danger that if she traveled too quickly, this rudder would be torn away as well.
Because of this, the Cutty Sark lost her lead. After crossing the Equator, the captain called in at a port to have a new rudder fitted,
but by now the Thermopylae was over five hundred miles ahead.
Though the new rudder was fitted at tremendous speed, it was impossible for the Cutty Sark to win. She arrived in England a week after the Thermopylae.
Even this was remarkable, considering that she had had so many delays.
These is no doubt that if she had not lost her rudder she would have won the race easily.